Detasselers live in two worlds. Organized detasseling is set up through various seed corn and corn hybrid companies like Pioneer or DeKalb. The beauty of working for an organized company is that you are guaranteed a paycheck and transportation to and from the field is provided. The downside is, it’s organized and I’m not much of a team player. I prefer to not have some crew boss barking at me to go faster or shattering my already fragile ego based on corn shucking sloppiness.
Freelance detasseling is a pretty sweet gig if you have the motivation to stick with it. Freelance essentially means that you rent out an acre or so (depending on how many are involved) and you are paid based on completion. When you work or how fast you work is entirely up to you.
I was probably about 14 years old when A, M and myself freelanced an acre or so of corn. We had already calculated the amount of money we would earn from our labours and all of the band equipment that we were going to by (we had a pretty stellar band going for a while…nobody could murder a Megadeth song like we could.). I don’t know if I was aware of Ampeg Amps at this time, but if I was I was probably going to buy an Ampeg half stack or something equally tantalizing.
To top it all off the land we were to be working was outside of A´s sister´s farm about 2 and half hours from home. This of course meant that we would be staying with his sister in a big ol´ farmhouse for a few weeks. We had big plans of unsupervised rural debauchery.
What we hadn’t counted on of course was getting our asses kicked by the amount of work we had taken on, the blistering Iowa sun and the stifling Iowa humidity. What I hadn’t mentioned earlier in the organized vs. freelance debate is that if you get on a good organized crew, you would often do your detasseling from a combine-like machine where you would hang from a basket above the corn. This meant no walking. There were no machines in freelance (unless you brought your own). I think we gave it a fair go for about two days.
Day one was solid work and no talking. We got up and went to work at 4am. A’s sister had brought some lunch out for us, which we wolfed down and immediately got back to work going straight on through until the punishment of the midday sun forced us out. We walked back that first day promising to return and get a few more hours in after dinner (Iowa dinners are generally between 6 and 7 pm). It was a good idea, except for our inability to detassel while asleep. None of us was able to make it through dinner without shaking off unconsciousness. Needless to say by 7.30 we were done for.
The enthusiasm had died by the next morning. Four a.m. was a bit of a joke and we slept through until 8 or 9 when A’s sister had to physically force us out of bed. We dawdled all the way to the field secretly hoping that we had been visited by the legendary corncob fairy the night before. There was no such luck. In fact after we had gotten started, it appeared that several of the stalks had grown their tops back. We were again later greeted with a delivered homemade lunch, which we ate a little slower than the day before. Again by midday we were flushed from the fields by the thrushing of the sun. On the way home there was no talk of going back later that night. In fact there was no talking at all.
Having been disenchanted at the lack of progress from the day before, we got up at 4 am again on the third day. The lack of conversation had also carried over from the previous day. We ate our breakfast without speaking and trudged back to the field without speaking. We got to the field, and again without speaking, we got to work.
I don’t remember how it started or who exactly started it, but either M or A began running across the field against the rows taking out large numbers of cornstalks with him. He ran right by me laughing and yelling something. Shortly thereafter came the other one (M or A) depending on who the first passerby was, swearing and shouting. When I finally caught up to them A was pushing M’s face into the fertile black soil. I remember feeling nonchalant about the whole thing. As I looked around at the fallen corn stalks, it struck me as simply less corn that I would need to detassel later. Until somehow, in what can best be described as a rolling cartoonish dust cloud of fighting engulfed me and I was pulled into the kicking, swearing, poking and punching.
It was eventually broken up by the arrival of A’s mother, who was stopping be to check up on her “little farmers”. We abruptly came to our senses noticing for the first time the destruction we had caused. In our thrashing about we had managed to create our own set of crop circles amongst the backdrop of the rolling Iowa hills.
That fight, as it turned out, was going to cost us money. It was later explained to that we would have to continue detasseling the field, but we were going to be receiving far less money than we had initially been promised. This was a let down that lead to a half-assed job. The visions of a rocking home studio gave way to the reality of just simply coming out of this and not having to pay the farmer for letting us toil in his fields. In the end we did such a half-assed job that I had been told later that A’s mother, sister and sister’s husband had gone out to finish up what we couldn’t be bothered to worry about. I never saw any money.
The band had suffered as well. Because A was the band leader, (he was the drummer and we had to play at his house) he kicked M out for getting us in trouble. This ultimately was the demise of the band. It does end on a happy note as A and M reformed a new band a week or so later, but they forgot to call me and accidentally called another bass player instead. I understood, those things happened sometimes.
Stay tuned for Part 2: The Part Where I Actually Talk About Grocery Stores
1 comment:
I did the contracted group thing, and It was pretty fun but exhausing. I remember stories of people getting tipped in the porta-johnny. I liked this post, made me remember some things I had forgotten.
Post a Comment